A reader asks:
I’ve added a domain name to my web host, but my webpage isn’t showing up. Instead, it’s taking me to a coming soon page. What’s wrong?

I’m going to assume it’s been a few hours since you purchased and set up your domain name, as it can take 24-48 hours for everything to work properly - though the process called “domain name propagation” (defined below) has become a lot faster recently. If it hasn’t been that long, give it a few hours. Otherwise, read on…

In a previous post, I explained a bit about domain names and web hosts but let me try to clarify. (Click to continue reading →)

Categories: Websites |

A few days ago, I noticed traffic to one of my sites had decreased to a trickle. Sensing something was wrong, I clicked to the site only to be notified:

After browsing through the StopBadware site, I determined I must have some malicious code somewhere on my website… Sure enough, at the very bottom was a strange block of code pointing to some foreign site.

This type of hack is more common than you think, so if this happens to you, here’s what to do: (Click to continue reading →)

Categories: Websites |

In response to my last post on marketing a blog, a reader asks:
What does a feed do or how does it work? I went to feedburner and registered my blog but it just made me a new feed… so what did registering on this site do for me?

Feeds are ways people can subscribe to your blog so they are notified whenever you have new content. They can read your feed in any number of programs like Google Reader, Bloglines, or on their MyYahoo! page. Basically, they copy and paste the link to your feed in one of those programs and hit subscribe. Then, whenever you publish new content, it will show up in their feed reader so they can go to your site to read your new articles. (Click to continue reading →)

Categories: Blogging |

A reader asks:
Why is our blog no where to be found? You can type in specific titles, etc in google’s blog search and on the plain web and we don’t come up. The google blog search said that it should automatically list your site if you have the rss feed, which we do. Any idea why we are still off the radar and do you know how to fix that?

Many new bloggers automatically assume that if they start a blog and write good content, readers will flock to their site. Oh, how I wish this was true! Unfortunately, your blog is just one of the 70 million blogs out there so in order to let search engines, bloggers, and general readers know your blog exists, you have to do a lot of marketing. Where do you start? (Click to continue reading →)

Categories: Blogging |

Download: MP3 (16.13 MB)

What You Will Learn:
This podcast will teach listeners what search engine optimization (SEO) is and why it’s important to ranking well in Google. Participants will learn:

• Comparisons/contrasts of information storage and retrieval before and after the Internet
• How search engines find pages
• How search engines return relevant results
• Major problems search engines face
• Why search engines aren’t as accurate as we’d like them to be
• How SEO helps search engines return relevant results

Who Will Benefit?
This podcast is a brief introduction to how search engines work, including how they find pages, how they categorize pages in their database, and how they return relevant results in just a few seconds. It provides a brief overview of what is required for high search engine rankings and problems search engines face such as relevancy issues (relevancy is subjective) and language problems.

Categories: Online Marketing, Optimization, Podcasts, Search Engine Marketing, Search Engines |

Today, we launched our new website design for our main site and blog, so if you notice any bugs or weirdness over the next 24-48 hours, bear with us.

What’s New:

• We’ve moved our blog from Blogger.com to Wordpress and it more-or-less went smoothly. Last time I did this, I documented the step-by-step overview so I could do it again if need be - and that was handy this time around.
• Our Feedburner site feed combines this site’s feed with our business book reviews site feed at Books4Biz.com.
• We’ve consolidated some of our niche marketing sites into this blog. We will no longer be updating BloggingCoach.com, SEOGetlisted.com or WebDesignCoach.net and all previous posts have been incorporated into this blog. Why? Primarily because we just don’t have time to keep them up-to-date. We figured it would be better to concentrate our efforts into posting more frequently on this blog.
• We have podcasts and lots of other freebies in our free resources section.
• Marketing Q&A - Have a marketing question? Ask us and we’ll answer it on our blog.

Categories: Announcements |

Moderator: Krista Baker
Download: MP3

What You Will Learn:
This podcast will teach listeners what search engine optimization (SEO) is and why it’s important to ranking well in Google. Participants will learn:

• What is SEO?
• Why SEO is important to small businesses
• The difference between SEO and spamming search engines
• How search engines rank websites
• 5 cornerstones of an SEO campaign
• Why no one can guarantee a top ranking on Google

Who Will Benefit?
Anyone who would like their site to rank well in Google and other search engines. This call will clear up misconceptions about search engine optimization, explain why it’s so difficult to rank well for popular keywords, and discuss the foundations for an effective SEO campaign. This call is directed at beginners.

Categories: Online Marketing, Podcasts, Search Engine Marketing, Search Engines |

Client Introduction
Galfand Berger is a Philadelphia law firm specializing in Personal Injury, Workers Compensation, and Medical Malpractice law.

Problem
Galfand Berger came to us because their old website hadn’t had a redesign in years, was difficult to navigate and find information, and contained out-of-date information. They wanted a facelift and to update the site’s contents themselves without having to learn html. They also wanted to generate more leads from their site.

Solution
We worked with Galfand Berger to clarify how their website would fit into their marketing plan, created a new design and navigation structure to make the site more user-friendly, and built a content management system so Galfand Berger could update the site themselves.We also consulted with them on running pay-per-click advertising campaigns and other online marketing initiatives like starting a firm blog and e-newsletter.  See the new site at www.galfandberger.com.

Categories: Firm News |

The Get Elastic Blog has put together a number of videos on “The Crazy, Messed Up World of Ecommerce”. So far, they have four videos posted on the topic - “What if offline shopping was as cruel and difficult as buying online?” Here’s their first one on “If Only Search Engines Could Understand What We Want.”

(Click to continue reading →)

Categories: Search Engines |